Mahjong CompendiumIndia / Mumbai style

Proto-mahjong › Chinese classical › Babcock rules › Western / British Empire style › India / Mumbai style

India / Mumbai style

rotating round rules

Sources

Sources

The documents this entry rests on, as published. Each can be opened and checked; nothing in this part is anybody’s reading of them.

  1. Guide Sloper, Tom. "FAQ 2b: Identifying a Mah-Jongg Variant." Sloperama. canonical checked 2026-09-18

    https://www.sloperama.com/mjfaq/mjfaq02b.html

    chart’s note Tile counts, hand sizes, flower handling and scoring for roughly 50 named variants. Primary source for most leaf nodes in this chart.

    for this variant The chart's canonical source, read 2026-09-18. Its rotating rounds rest on Sloper's 2009 visit to Mumbai (columns 396 and 399); the Mahjong Calling guidebook now confirms them independently. Its goulash wording, all pungs in one suit, is stricter than Sloper's own column 396 and the guidebook, which ask for a clean hand

    Also cited on: Chinese archaic, Late Qing style, Chinese pre-classical, Chinese classical, Shanghai / Hong Kong new style, Hong Kong old style and 45 more · bibliography #1

  2. Guide Sloper, Tom. "Weekly Mah-Jong" column 396: "British/Western Mah-Jong." Sloperama, 8 March 2009. cross-check checked 2026-10-08

    https://www.sloperama.com/mahjongg/column396b.html

    AI summary Written before his visit to Mumbai, from what his hosts had told him: their game is always four rounds, listed as four sets and a pair, special hands, clean pungs-only hands and dealer's choice, with pictures of the round-two special hands. He still calls it British/Western here.

    for this variant Sloper's first, second-hand account of the four-round format; same author as the chart's source, so not independent. It gives the third round as half-flush pungs, not all pungs in one suit as FAQ 2b has it

    Also cited on: Western / British Empire style · bibliography #337

  3. Guide Sloper, Tom. "Weekly Mah-Jong" column 399: "Mumbai-Style Mahjong." Sloperama, 29 March 2009. cross-check checked 2026-10-08

    https://www.sloperama.com/mahjongg/column399i.html

    AI summary His report after visiting Mumbai and why he now counts its game as a separate variant: rules that change by round, buying a discard with a chip into the kitty, the Passport, and decks of cards that assign each player a special hand. A 2012 update links Sushila Singh's site.

    for this variant Sloper's report from Mumbai and the basis of FAQ 2b's entry; same author, so not independent. It places the rotating rounds across India and is the first account of the hand cards that the Mahjong Calling guidebook still uses

    Only cited here · bibliography #338

  4. Guide Sloper, Tom. "Mahjong in Mumbai, Part 1: My Mumbai Mahjong Adventure." Sloperama, 2009. cross-check checked 2026-10-08

    https://www.sloperama.com/Mumbai/mumbai1.html

    AI summary Photo diary of the three-day mahjong event of 18 to 20 March 2009 in Mumbai, organised by Sushila Singh in private homes and at the Cricket Club of India, with tables playing Mumbai-Style, a winning hand, and a scan of the DNA report.

    for this variant Same author as the chart's source; adds no rule of the rounds, but shows the knitted pairs the guidebook's East round allows and leads to the DNA report

    Only cited here · bibliography #339

  5. Rulebook Mahjong Calling (Akanksha Mittal). "Mahjong Calling - Rules Guidebook." mahjongcalling.com, c. 2025. cross-check checked 2026-10-08

    https://mahjongcalling.com/pages/rules-guide-to-mahjong

    AI summary The illustrated guidebook sold with a card edition of mahjong by the company of a Mumbai teacher, published on the site as page images. It sets out a full game of four rounds of four games (East, South with small hand cards, West goulash, North dealer's choice or big cards), with passports, card exchanges and goulash scoring.

    for this variant Independent of Sloper and the chart: a Mumbai teacher's printed rules of about 2025, sold with a card edition of the game. It confirms the node's defining fact, four rounds each with its own rules, matching FAQ 2b's chicken, special-hands, goulash and dealer's-choice-with-wild-tiles rounds and the buying of discards in some of them. It asks only that the goulash hand be clean, not in one suit

    Only cited here · bibliography #342

  6. Commercial Mahjong.Live. Variants and rules pages for Indian Heritage Mahjong, 9-6-5 Passport and Goulash. mahjong.live, 2026. cross-check checked 2026-10-08

    https://mahjong.live/learn/variants

    AI summary An online four-player mahjong platform whose rule sets include Indian games: Indian Heritage Mahjong, 5-, 6- and 9-card Passport hands, Goulash, Psycho Lover and Mahjong Gita. The full rules are drawn by script; each page as served carries a one-line summary.

    for this variant By another author than Sloper and not cited by the chart, though FAQ 2b now links the site. It confirms the goulash as an all-pungs game needing three doubles, as the guidebook has it, but presents the rounds' games as separate variants and says nothing of a rotation

    Only cited here · bibliography #343

  7. Journalism Hinduja, Udit. "After Mumbai, Mahjong invades Delhi's social circles. Poker is out." ThePrint, 30 August 2025. cross-check checked 2026-10-08

    https://theprint.in/ground-reports/mahjong-delhi-elites-army-wives/2732212/

    AI summary A ground report on mahjong among Army wives and the urban elite in Delhi and Mumbai: teachers, clubs, cheat sheets of 64 named hands, Indian versions with jokers and a 'Mahjong Gita', and the game's spread through Army postings.

    for this variant Independent Indian press. It confirms that varied rounds, jokers and named special hands belong to the game Indians play, but states no round's rules, and its Delhi players may follow the army wives' style rather than Mumbai's

    Only cited here · bibliography #344

  8. Journalism Tahseen, Ismat. "It's the game of a 1,000 intelligences." DNA (Daily News & Analysis), Mumbai, 21 March 2009. cross-check checked 2026-10-08

    https://web.archive.org/web/20240922013427/https://www.dnaindia.com/lifestyle/report-it-s-the-game-of-a-1000-intelligences-1240987

    AI summary Report of a mahjong session at Chandrakala Agrawala's home in Colaba during Tom Sloper's visit, quoting him on the Indian game's two styles and naming Sushila Pratap Singh as a long-standing Mumbai teacher. The page carries a 2013 update date. The link is to the Wayback Machine capture of 22 September 2024.

    for this variant An Indian newspaper and the earliest independent report found of an organised Mumbai game, but its words on the rules are Sloper's, so it does not corroborate the rounds. It separates a Mumbai way from an army wives' style, as The Nod still does in 2025 (Willingdon against ATF)

    Only cited here · bibliography #340

  9. Guide Singh, Sushila. "The Mumbai Style Mahjongg." themumbaistylemahjongg.com, 2012-2013. cross-check checked 2026-10-08

    https://web.archive.org/web/20130814210533/http://themumbaistylemahjongg.com/

    AI summary Website of the Mumbai teacher and organiser who was Tom Sloper's host in 2009, with rules pages set out by round and score sheets. Only the home page survives, in Wayback Machine captures of 2013 to 2016; the link is to the capture of 14 August 2013.

    for this variant The Mumbai teacher Sloper names as his source, writing for her own players; independent of him in authorship though the page quotes him. Only the menu survives: a South round with its own cheat sheet and separate scores for any game, special hands and goulash, which fits the rotating rounds without stating them

    Only cited here · bibliography #341

  10. Journalism Gupta, Nidhi. "Mahjong's most loyal audience? Ladies who lunch." The Nod, 16 December 2025. cross-check checked 2026-10-08

    https://thenodmag.com/content/mahjong-parties-karwa-chauth-women-2025

    AI summary A feature on mahjong networks, teachers and parties in Mumbai, Delhi, Goa and other Indian cities in 2025, which names the regional styles players use: Willingdon in Mumbai and Pune, ATF in Delhi and Bangalore, and Taiwanese.

    for this variant Independent Indian press and the only source found that names the Mumbai game as players now call it, after the Willingdon Sports Club; it says nothing of its rules

    Only cited here · bibliography #345

  11. Journalism Kumar, Ishira. "How Mahjong Is Becoming India's Most Stylish New Social Scene." SheThePeople, 28 July 2025. cross-check checked 2026-10-08

    https://www.shethepeople.tv/author-spotlight/guest-contributions/mahjong-india-social-scene-ishira-kumar-9585851

    AI summary A guest column by a co-founder of The Mahjong Network on mahjong as a women's social scene in Indian cities.

    for this variant Independent and Indian, but a passing mention: players speak of a goulash round, which fits the rotating rounds

    Only cited here · bibliography #346

  12. Commercial 1MILLIONSTUDIOS Private Limited. "Mahjong Social: Taiwanese and Bombay Mahjong!" App Store listing. cross-check checked 2026-10-08

    https://apps.apple.com/us/app/mahjong-social/id6755966486

    AI summary The listing of an online four-player mahjong game with a skill rating, offering Taiwanese and 'Bombay-style' Chinese mahjong. For Bombay style three of the four rounds are built.

    for this variant Independent. That the Bombay-style rounds are built one at a time fits rules that change by round, but the listing describes none of them

    Only cited here · bibliography #347

AI-generated

Analysis

Written by an AI model from the sources above. It is a reading of them, not a source in its own right: every figure in it points back to a numbered source, and where the two disagree, the source is right.

Assessment

Confidence
catalogued listed in a variant catalogue with tile counts and hand sizes, but no rules text verified
Evidence
corroborated two or more independent sources agree on the facts that define this variant

Cross-comparison

What each source was read to say, set side by side. The numbers are the sources above.

SourceTilesHandFlowersScoringPayout
[1]14413, out on 14melded instantly when receivedcount points for pungs/kongs etc., then doubleall players earn points
[1]14413, out on 14; many special hands, similar to Western/British or Wright-Pattersonmelded instantly when receivedcount points for pungs, kongs etc., then doubleall players earn points; all players put chips in a kitty at the start of each hand
[2]—round-two special hands named as Gate Hands, Snake Hands, Jewel Hands, Unique Wonders (13 Orphans), Crochet (Knitting), Gertie's Garter, Greta's Garden and Dragon & Pairs———
[3]—a Passport of 5 or 6 unique honour tiles can be used with other combinations in the Special Hands round; in that round some groups deal each player a card naming the special hand she must make——a discard can be bought by adding a chip to the kitty and taken into the concealed hand
[4]—a winning Mumbai-Style hand shown: a pure straight with a duplicate of one of its tiles, plus two knitted pairs of terminals———
[5]144 cards in place of tiles, with 55 small and 29 big hand cards14 to go out. East round: any 3+3+3+3+2 of pungs, chows, mixed chows and crochets with a pure pair or knit, or a Passport, which the table may make compulsory. South round: the hand on a small card each player draws. West round (Goulash): only pungs and kongs and a pure pair. North round: dealer's choice of the other rounds' games, or big cardsreplaced from a flower wall; in the North round's small-card and goulash games all Flowers and Seasons are jokersgoulash needs at least three doubles, and a clean hand for its points to count; small cards carry their own scoresa player who discards to a goulash hand with three exposed pungs pays for all players; buying is not allowed in the goulash round and is allowed in the North round
[6]—all pungs—three doubles—
[6]—win with any one of the 9-card, 6-card or 5-card Passport hands———
[7]—beginners in Delhi use cheat sheets of 64 winning hands with names such as Hitler's Blunder, Mixed Noodles and Chinese Dragon———
  • [1] each round uses different rules: one permits chicken hands, another requires special hands, another is a goulash requiring all pungs in one suit, the fourth is dealer's choice with wild tiles; in some rounds a player can buy a discard. Sloper corrected his own earlier assumption that this was the same as British/Western after visiting Mumbai in March 2009
  • [1] Read 2026-10-08. Each round uses different rules: one permits chicken hands, one requires special hands, one is a 'goulash' requiring all pungs in one suit, and the fourth is dealer's choice in which wild tiles may be declared; in some rounds a discard can be bought. The entry now also lists an exchange of tiles called the Goulash after a drawn game and a Passport, a 5-, 6- or 9-card pattern that makes a hand winnable, with a link to mahjong.live/learn/variants. Its index of variants gives India/Mumbai no books
  • [2] Written 8 March 2009, before the visit, from what his Mumbai hosts told him. Their game is always four rounds: a modified Classical-style four sets and a pair; special hands; clean hands (half flush), pungs only; and dealer's choice. He still calls it British/Western mah-jong
  • [3] Written 29 March 2009, after the visit. Sloper now calls the game Mumbai-Style Mahjong and a separate variant. Each round has its own rules, and that is how most players in India, not only in Mumbai, play. Sushila Singh, 'the main driving force behind mahjong in Mumbai', was trying to replace the hand cards with a list from which a hand may be chosen freely
  • [4] Sloper's diary of the event of 18 to 20 March 2009: a talk, then tables playing Mumbai-Style at a private home in Colaba, then foreign styles taught at the Cricket Club of India. It reproduces the DNA report of 21 March 2009
  • [8] DNA's report of the session at Chandrakala Agrawala's home in Colaba. Sloper is quoted calling India's rules the most complex and challenging, with two styles, the Indian army wives' style and the Mumbai way. Agrawala had won the Mahjong Challenge Cup, had learnt from Sushila Pratap Singh, a Mumbai teacher of many years, and hoped to form a Mahjong Association in Mumbai
  • [9] The home page as captured on 14 August 2013 (the April 2013 capture has the same menu). Its rules menu runs ESWN Round The Mumbai Style Mahjongg, South Round Cheat Sheet, Any Game Score, Special Hand Score, Goulash Doubles and Counting Score Card. The rules pages were never captured
  • [5] A full game is 16 games in 4 rounds of 4, each player being East once a round: Round 1 East Round; Round 2 South Round, small cards; Round 3 West Round, Goulash; Round 4 North Round, East's (the dealer's) choice, big cards or goulash with jokers. The South and West rounds open with three compulsory exchanges of three cards and an optional tic-tac-toe. The rules are on page images (pages 5, 7, 12, 26 and 30 read 2026-10-08); the quotes are from the page's section menu
  • [6] The served summary of the Goulash rule set: all-pungs hands, three doubles, Charleston and wall exchange, flowers scoring as bonuses. The site offers it as one game among its Indian rule sets, beside Indian Heritage Mahjong (mixed chow, crochet, fishing required, jokers wild) and the Passport games
  • [6] The served summary of the 9-6-5 Passport rule set. The site's script holds the hands: a 9-card Passport of three matching melds, a 6-card one of three matching pairs, a 5-card one of winds (N.E.W.S.) or dragons (G.R.W.), each completed with free melds and a pair, without jokers
  • [7] A Mumbai learner says the game has different rounds; a Delhi teacher who plays only traditional Chinese mahjong dislikes versions with jokers popular in India; a Mumbai learner mentions a version called Mahjong Gita. Teachers trace the game in India to Army wives who learnt it in England, Burma and South-East Asia
  • [10] An organiser says most of Mumbai and Pune play 'Willingdon' while Delhi and Bangalore play 'ATF', and a workshop in Ludhiana was taught by a senior Willingdon teacher, 'the Mumbai variation of the game'. A Mumbai session played three rounds, or ten games
  • [11] A co-founder of The Mahjong Network refers in passing to the Goulash round
  • [12] An online game by 1MILLIONSTUDIOS Private Limited offering 'Bombay-style' Chinese mahjong with chow and pung claims. For Bombay style the East, South and West rounds are built and North is to come, while its Taiwanese game has all four

Reading it

Sloper's FAQ 2b, re-read on 8 October 2026, still describes India/Mumbai mahjong as a 144-tile game whose four rounds each have their own rules: a chicken round, a special-hands round, a goulash of pungs and a dealer's choice with wild tiles, with discards bought in some rounds. His columns 396 and 399 and his 2009 diary are its basis, so they are not independent. The Mahjong Calling guidebook, a Mumbai teacher's printed rules of about 2025, confirms the structure on its own account: sixteen games in four rounds, East any hand or a Passport, South a special hand drawn on a card, West a goulash of pungs and kongs needing three doubles, North the dealer's choice with flowers as jokers, and buying allowed outside the goulash. mahjong.live, the Mahjong Social listing, ThePrint, The Nod and SheThePeople agree in part: Bombay-style rounds built one by one, a goulash round, varied rounds, jokers. The sources differ on whether the goulash must be in one suit (FAQ 2b) or only clean (column 396, the guidebook), and FAQ 2b also uses goulash for the exchange after a drawn hand. Players now call the Mumbai game Willingdon and set it against Delhi's ATF. Still wanted: Sushila Singh's lost rules pages, the Willingdon club's rules and Indian newspaper archives. Sushila Singh is very likely also the correspondent behind Sloper's Nepalese entry of 2003, which makes her the informant for both nodes; the Mahjong Calling guidebook, by another teacher, is the independent witness here.

Looked for, not found

  • Official rules No governing body: DNA (2009) reports only a hope to form a Mahjong Association in Mumbai, and the Free Press Journal (2025) says India has yet to formalise a federation. The web searches found no association's rules
  • Law No source read ties the game in India to a statute or regulator; it is played in homes and private clubs, and Indian gambling acts were not searched for it
  • Historical Internet Archive full text (mahjong with Bombay, Mumbai, goulash and passport) gave nothing on the game in India before Sloper's 2009 reports; Indian newspaper archives such as the Times of India's are by subscription and were not reached (2026-10-08)
  • Encyclopedia English Wikipedia search returned no article on Indian or Mumbai mahjong before the API answered 429, Wikidata answered 429, and the Mahjong Wiki has no Indian ruleset (2026-10-08)
  • Forum Reddit and BoardGameGeek refuse automated readers, the Mahjong India Facebook group named by ThePrint needs a login, and no open forum of players in India turned up in the web searches (2026-10-08)
  • Organisation The Poona Club's Mah-Jong Room page (read 2026-10-08) describes the room and gives no rules; no page of the Willingdon Sports Club or the Cricket Club of India on mahjong turned up, and The Mahjong Network and Let's Mahjong were found only in the press
  • Collection Not searched: no source read names an Indian set in a museum or library catalogue; the antique sets ThePrint describes are private

Known, not yet read

Sources that look worth having but could not be read for this entry. If you can reach one, it can be read and added. Every variant’s list is gathered on Missing sources.

  • Guide Singh, Sushila. Rules pages of The Mumbai Style Mahjongg: 'ESWN Round The Mumbai Style Mahjongg', 'South Round Cheat Sheet', 'Any Game Score', 'Special Hand Score', 'Goulash Doubles' and 'Counting Score Card' (themumbaistylemahjongg.com, 2012-2013) — The rules of the rotating rounds as written by the Mumbai teacher Sloper names as his source, for her own players; they would show the rounds and their scoring as Mumbai set them out in 2012
    Where: Formerly at themumbaistylemahjongg.com/eswn-round-the-mumbai-style-mahjongg/ and its sibling paths, and on the mirror mahjongg.mrovaprojects.com; possibly with Sushila Singh or her players. Tried: Wayback CDX listings of both domains on 2026-10-08: only the home page and one Nepal page were captured, and the site answered the archive's crawler with 403 from October 2016. A gap in the archive, not a refusal to this reader
  • Tournament rules Willingdon Sports Club, Mumbai: its mahjong tournament or house rules (the 'Willingdon' style) — The Nod (2025) says most of Mumbai and Pune play 'Willingdon', the Mumbai variation, and the club has held tournaments since at least December 2023; its written rules would be the nearest thing to a standard for the Mumbai game
    Where: Willingdon Sports Club, Mumbai (members only), or the teachers who teach there, several of whom The Nod's directory of 1 August 2025 names. Tried: Web searches for Willingdon mahjong rules on 2026-10-08 found nothing, and no club page on mahjong turned up
  • Scholarship Oxfeld, Ellen. Blood, Sweat, and Mahjong: Family and Enterprise in an Overseas Chinese Community. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1993. ISBN 080142593X — An ethnography of the Chinese of Calcutta whose title names the game; it may say how Chinese Indians played and whether their game touched the rules other Indians play
    Where: Internet Archive, bloodsweatmahjon0000oxfe (lending only); university libraries. Tried: Internet Archive metadata read on 2026-10-08: access-restricted, borrow only, and not borrowed

Where it was searched

Every place the search checklist names for this variant’s languages, and what each gave, including nothing. The last full pass was on 2026-10-08.

Names searched: English India / Mumbai style, India/Mumbai mahjong, Mumbai-Style Mahjong, Mumbai Style Mahjongg, Bombay-style Mahjong, Bombay Mahjong, Willingdon, Indian Heritage Mahjong, Indian mahjong.

16 places searched
  • General web search — 2026-10-08, standard mode only, in English. Queries: "Mumbai style" mahjong rounds goulash; mahjong club Mumbai women Times of India; mahjong Kolkata Calcutta club goulash; "Indian mahjong" passport goulash special hands; "Willingdon" mahjong rules rounds; "Mahjong Gita" India; sloperama Mumbai Sushila Singh; mahjong India crochet fishing passport jokers army wives; Indian goulash, special-hands, chicken and dealer's-choice rounds; House of Mahjong, Let's Mahjong and The Mahjong Network rules; Indian mahjong rulebook; "ATF" mahjong India; YouTube Indian mahjong goulash. Read: ThePrint (30 Aug 2025), The Nod (1 Aug and 16 Dec 2025), SheThePeople (9 and 28 Jul 2025), Free Press Journal (14 Sep 2025), Esquire India (20 Aug 2026), DT Next (Chennai, 1 Aug 2026), Restaurant India on The Mahjong Club in Khar (opened 26 Aug 2026), Le Mill India's journal (20 Jun 2025), and, through The Nod's directory of teachers, Mahjong Calling's site and guidebook. FPJ, Esquire, DT Next, Restaurant India and SheThePeople of 9 July say nothing on the rules beyond 'games with an Indian touch' and 'thousands of variations'; Outlook Traveller's OT Eats piece on The Mahjong Club (6 Sep 2026) came back without its body. On names: every Indian source read calls the game mahjong, Mah Jong at the Poona Club; Le Mill glosses it 'Chinese rummy i.e., Mahjong'; players set 'Willingdon' (Mumbai, Pune) against 'ATF' (Delhi, Bangalore), and ThePrint mentions a 'Mahjong Gita'. No Indian-language writing on the game turned up, and the registry has no Indian language, so the names are in English only. Unread leads: Financial Express Mumbai, 'Mahjong mania' (Oct 2025), and The Sindhian, 'Mahjong and mingle', both on Magzter. The search tool refuses timesofindia.indiatimes.com, hindustantimes.com, mid-day.com, mumbaimirror.indiatimes.com, thehindu.com, indianexpress.com and livemint.com as domains
  • Wikidata — wbsearchentities for 'Mumbai mahjong' and 'Indian mahjong' answered 429 from the shared address three times on 2026-10-08; no item found
  • Wikipedia, in every declared language — One English Wikipedia search (mahjong with Mumbai, Bombay or India, and goulash) on 2026-10-08 returned only the general Mahjong, International Mind Sports Association, World Mind Sports Games and Three-player mahjong articles; later calls, including the Mahjong article's wikitext, answered 429. No article on Indian or Mumbai mahjong was found
  • The sources' own references, and who cites them — Backward, one round, from FAQ 2b: columns 396 and 399, Sloper's 'Mahjong in Mumbai' part 1 (part 2 is sightseeing), Sushila Singh's site (home page, through the Wayback Machine), the DNA report of 21 March 2009 that part 1 links (through the Wayback Machine) and mahjong.live, which FAQ 2b now links. Leads for a second round, unread: the Mahjong Calling guidebook's other pages (passport combinations, small and big cards, goulash scoring chart); mahjong.live's script-drawn rules for Indian Heritage Mahjong, Psycho Lover and Mahjong Gita; Sloper's Q&A bulletin board archive for Mumbai threads; his talk 'My Mumbai Mahjong Adventure, 2009', listed on sloperama.com. Forward citation was not searched
  • Internet Archive full-text search — Full-text search of texts on 2026-10-08 for mahjong Bombay goulash, "mah jong" Bombay club and mahjong Mumbai passport goulash found only dictionaries, Who's Who entries and unrelated pages. The metadata search for mahjong with India, Bombay, Mumbai or Calcutta found Hong Kong newspapers and Ellen Oxfeld's Blood, Sweat, and Mahjong (1993), which is lending-only
  • Wayback Machine — CDX listings on 2026-10-08. themumbaistylemahjongg.com has home-page captures from April 2013 to June 2016 (read: 15 April and 14 August 2013), a 403 from October 2016, and one Nepal page; its rules pages (eswn-round-the-mumbai-style-mahjongg, south-round-cheat-sheet, any-game-score, special-hand-score, doubles-for-goulash-score, counting-score-card) were never captured, and its mirror mahjongg.mrovaprojects.com has only images and CSS (2016). The DNA article's old URL report.asp?newsid=1240987 redirects to the 2013 slug, captured in 2021 and 2024 (read). web.archive.org answered 'Temporarily Offline' once and reset TLS connections; retries succeeded
  • Google Books — Not searched: the Books API answered 429 in earlier passes, and the sources read know no book on the Indian game except the Mahjong Calling guidebook
  • HathiTrust full-text search — Not searched: Cloudflare challenges automated readers, and the written record of the game found so far begins in 2009
  • WorldCat — Not searched directly. Open Library searches for mahjong with Bombay, Mumbai, Calcutta and India (2026-10-08) found no book published in India; its publish_place filter was ignored. Oxfeld's Blood, Sweat, and Mahjong (Cornell, 1993), on the Chinese of Calcutta, is the only India-related title, and is listed as wanted
  • Scholarly indexes — Not searched: OpenAlex wants a key, and the web searches turned up no scholarly work on the Indian game. Oxfeld (1993) is listed as wanted
  • YouTube — One web search for YouTube explainers of Indian mahjong's goulash or passport rounds (2026-10-08) found none; YouTube itself was not searched
  • English-language forums — Not searched: Reddit and BoardGameGeek refuse automated readers. ThePrint names a Mahjong India Facebook group started by Vineeta Sahni, which needs a login; Sloper's Q&A bulletin board archive is a lead
  • Mahjong reference sites — Sloperama: FAQ 2b, columns 396 and 399 and 'Mahjong in Mumbai' part 1 read on 2026-10-08. The Mahjong Wiki's search page is drawn by script and returned nothing for Mumbai or India; its menu of rulesets has no Indian entry
  • App and platform listings — The web search turned up Mahjong Social (App Store id 6755966486, 1MILLIONSTUDIOS Private Limited), whose listing was read; it offers 'Bombay-style' mahjong. mahjong.live, a browser game with Indian rule sets, was read. Google Play was not searched
  • English-language newspaper archives — The listed archives (Chronicling America, Trove, Papers Past, NewspaperSG, BNA) were not searched: the game is Indian and its record recent. Indian papers were reached through the web search: DNA 2009 (through the Wayback Machine), ThePrint, The Nod, SheThePeople and the Free Press Journal (2025), Esquire India and DT Next (2026). The Times of India, Hindustan Times, Mid-Day, Mumbai Mirror, The Hindu, Indian Express and Mint could not be searched, because the search tool refuses their domains, and their archives are by subscription. No Kolkata or Calcutta coverage, and no feature on Parsi, Bohra, Anglo-Indian or Chinese-Indian players, turned up
  • Statutes published in English — Not searched: no source read ties the Indian game to a statute, and the jurisdictions listed are not where it is played

In the tree

Descends from Western / British Empire style, as the source chart draws it.

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